


put your emptiness to melody

by a_simple_space_nerd



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fix-It, Gen, Good Brother Ben Hargreeves, Good Brother Klaus Hargreeves, I'm just bitter, Vanya Hargreeves Deserves Better, Vanya Hargreeves Needs A Hug, akshjhks I promise I don't actually dislike all the others, because the last episodes hurt me, but then again... who isn't, if this family doesn't sort their shit out then so help me god I will sort it FOR THEM, in this house we stan Vanya and Klaus and ONLY Vanya and Klaus, love u ben, oh and we also stan my son ben who's never done anything wrong ever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-17
Updated: 2019-03-17
Packaged: 2019-11-21 11:46:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18141770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_simple_space_nerd/pseuds/a_simple_space_nerd
Summary: Vanya is glowing. Her suit has transformed from black to white, the light crawling down her arms, and her skin is shining as though there are LEDs under the surface, fireflies behind her eyes. It doesn’t hurt to look at; it hurts to look away.(Her siblings have been pushed to the side, off the stage and nearly out of sight. Vanya isn’t looking at them. No one is.) (In hindsight, loving them was the most exhausting thing Vanya’s ever done.)





	put your emptiness to melody

**Author's Note:**

> title is from "to noise making (sing)" by hozier and everyone please go stream "wasteland, baby!" immediately 
> 
> this is a mess but i had this dream where vanya's concert went a bit differently, woke up and immediately wrote it, so here we go: a story where vanya gets her moment on the stage and doesn't allow her siblings to make it all about themselves. anyways i'm a vanya apologist first and a human being second, i would die for vanya and klaus, all other hargreeves (except ben bc i love my son) can lowkey catch these hands and in this ted talk i will--

She throws Pogo out a window. He was looking at her like he didn’t know her, which was fucking _infuriating,_ because it’s her who doesn’t know _him._ She trusted him, they all trusted him, and Vanya is beginning to realise she never should have trusted anyone because all they’ve ever done is hurt her.The voice of the little girl she once was is screaming in the back of her head, screaming like she did when Pogo let her father lock the door to that cage, over and over again.

She doesn’t know where he landed. She throws Pogo out the window as the basement burns, leaves her childhood home in ruins and doesn’t look back once.

* * *

She isn’t sure how she got home, or what she’s doing there. She blinks, and her violin is in her hand, and then she pauses by the door because she feels _something,_ or she feels that she _should_ feel something, but then she blinks and she’s on stage so whatever it was must not have matter very much at all.

The concert starts and Vanya doesn’t feel anything. A part of her, small and distant, writhes in fury that Reginald took this from her too—that he stifled her emotions and her powers both, leaving one to overtake the other after the inevitable explosion. Vanya picks up her bow, pushes down the faint screaming in the back of her skull, and touches string to string.

* * *

Her siblings charge at her, and Vanya thinks _oh._ Allison was standing in front of her, and there was something like pride shining in her eyes, and Vanya had felt that  _something_ swell up in her chest and bubble out of her skin in waves. But Allison isn’t standing in front of her anymore, and Luther is running at her, and they will _kill her._ Vanya’s family is going to kill her. _Oh_.

She isn’t really surprised. She sweeps her bow and holds them in place, white light forming a barricade between them and holding them in place, but she doesn’t tether herself to them. She’s so tired of them. She’s so tired loving them.

She’s worked long years to get where she is now. This is her concert, this is her song and her time. (There’s a part of Vanya that wants to raze the hall to the ground for the simple fact that Helen from first chair didn’t go _missing_ at all, and maybe Vanya will never know if she was good enough, if she is good enough. Most of Vanya just wants everyone to shut up.) She’s not surprised that her siblings couldn’t just let her have this, this _one concert,_ because it’s so like them. She knows that before tonight they didn’t even know she had a concert, that they’re only here now because they’re small and scared. When the conductor gave her seats to reserve, she left them empty.

But Vanya is first chair now, despite Leonard, despite Helen. She’s centre stage, playing in a hall with the lights shining down and light shining out from her. Vanya’s father is dead, and she’s stopped caring about the people she once thought were her family. (Allison was proud of her, for just a moment. Or at least, it looked like pride, but Vanya hasn’t ever seen it before, so maybe she’s wrong.)

Loving them was, looking back, the most exhausting thing Vanya’s ever done.

(She loved them with everything she was, despite the pills, despite their father and their differences and her lack of differences. She loved them so much and they never once loved her back, not like that, not more than they loved themselves. It's okay, though. She can stop now.)

Luther is still straining against the bonds Vanya’s placed in him, and she lets the pressure grow, just a bit, just enough to make him stagger. She wants to rip and tear at his heart like he did hers, she wants him to _suffer_ but Vanya is on the stage and Luther doesn’t matter. He never did, not like he thought. Diego is struggling too, though not as strongly as Number One, and Vanya pushes him back a few steps just because she can. Diego has always pushed her out of places she should have belonged in, and she won’t let him do it again. The stage is hers, right now, and he isn’t allowed to approach it.

Five is staring at her, and at the others, hiding his desperation under determination. He won’t break her barrier. They can’t hurt her anymore. Vanya won’t let them hurt her anymore. Five always leaves, when she needs him. He’d kill her now, she knows that, but he won’t get the chance because Vanya isn’t going to let them get close ever again. Klaus, while Five is searching for some way to push back, is staring at Vanya with something like awed resignation on his face. Maybe he thinks he’s going to die. Maybe he’s sorry. He’s looking at her like someone looks at a bomb when it’s already gone off, but also like he looked at her when she was beating her palms bloody against the glass of Luther’s cage. (Maybe Vanya would pity him, but that bleeding heart of his has never extended its blinding love towards her.) He’s staring like he’s watching everything spiral and he can’t do anything to stop it.

It’s okay. Vanya won’t let it spiral. She’s in control, now. More than she was at the house, because the others have been pushed away and she’s on stage with her true power in her hands, the power she’s worked long years to perfect. She’s still watching everything happen with a distant sort of acknowledgement, still disconnected, but she can feel every tremor of the strings under her fingers, every waver of her bow. She _feels_ the music, ringing and soaring under her skin and throughout the air. Vanya isn’t holding back, anymore, and she can _feel._ (Not like her siblings do, or anyone else can, not emotions or feelings, but the music is _breathing_ and it’s _living_ and she’s singing with it.)

Allison is behind her, unsteady, but Vanya jerks her head and she walks into the same trap of light that’s holding her siblings hostage. Vanya turns her attention away from them, for good, _she’s safe now,_ and she stands up—unscripted, the conductor is looking more and more shell-shocked but his eyes are glazed and Vanya knows he’s feeling the music come alive like she is—and lets the music consume her.

It’s pouring out of her, the music and the fact that she can finally feel it, the fact that she can  _feel_ at all. All the heartache and the misery and the anger, Vanya channels it through her bow and her siblings watch it ripple across the audience. Chandeliers are spinning in lazy circles above her, candles floating in the air, and Vanya learns what it is like to be alive. This is what Reginald had stamped out of her. The _sound_ , the overwhelming _sound_ of everyday life. She can hear everything, all of it blanketed in the notes she’s creating, and the room is glowing gold because she is making it.

(Her siblings have been pushed to the side, off the stage and nearly out of sight. Vanya isn’t looking at them. No one is. Allison is crying, and maybe she’s scared or sad but there’s pride there, too.  Luther is still struggling weakly, but his mouth is agape. Diego has stopped struggling expect for bursts of anger that only serve to tighten Vanya’s hold on him, and he’s staring at Vanya in confusion while Five tries not to panic. Klaus is smiling, laughing, and there are tears on his face and he thinks maybe he’s going to die but he can’t possible think of a better way to die.)

(Vanya is glowing. Her suit has transformed from black to white, the light crawling down her arms, and her skin is shining as though there are LEDs under the surface, fireflies behind her eyes. It doesn’t hurt to look at. It hurts to look away.)

The music is all-encompassing. The audience dies and is reborn, the hall is baptised, her violin the paintbrush she uses to douse the world in sound. Vanya drowns in it and has never felt so alive.

* * *

The concert ends, eventually. There is light, everywhere, shining out of Vanya and rippling from her violin. People sway in subconscious synchronisation, Vanya’s spell leaving none untouched, as she gets brighter and brighter and brighter... and the concert ends, eventually.

It takes the audience a few moments to respond, blinking as though to shake off their captivation. Then they’re surging to their feet, unsteady, and the applause swells throughout the hall. The candles drift back to their holders. Windows are shattered but there’s no glass. The chandeliers sway and still, the other musicians squinting like they’re waking from a deep sleep, glancing in awed befuddlement at their instruments and the sheets in front of them (the sheets that they suddenly hadn’t needed, Vanya’s music guiding them to where they needed to go).

Vanya smiles at the audience. Her glow is fading, but it’s still there. The applause continues, and she takes a bow. Her smile is soft. It’s the smile that makes Five pause, that makes him stumble and stare at his little sister, wonder sinking into his bones. Klaus exhales shakily, his cheeks wet and his fists glowing blue—he isn’t sure when Ben had shown up, but they’re holding hands and Ben is staring at Vanya like she’s the sun.  

Vanya sighs, still smiling, the sound shuddering gently throughout the hall, and a soft blow of cool wind caresses their cheeks. She turns and slips past their other musicians, towards the back of the stage, and from where they are still held by softly glowing light her siblings can only watch as she disappears.

When the light fades—only a few minutes later—they all stager, save Klaus, who had stopped fighting to reach her early on.

The siblings meet each other’s eyes, then pale in unison— “Ben!” Allison’s crying, pulling him into a hug, and then Diego is lurching over to grab the back of Ben’s neck and draw him close. Luther tries to join but he’s too bulky, and Five stops him with a hand on his arm as Ben sends Luther a strangely wary glance.

“Hey,” Klaus says shakily, drawing his family’s attention. Ben detangles himself to pull Klaus into a hug of his own, Klaus’ face pressed into the crook of his neck, eyes squeezed tightly shut, his glowing hands grasping the back of Ben’s sweater.

“You did it,” Ben breathes, “Klaus, we did it—” His voice is wet and amazed, and that’s when the shooting starts.

 

By the time they’ve managed to fight off the masked men, Vanya’s glow has left the hall. In the wake of her leaving the magic faded, and her chaos is made newly evident in broken windows and cracked tiles. Outside, the streetlights have blown out. Cars have moved, walls shifted, concrete splintered. The group remains; Klaus channelled Ben and together they unleashed the creatures under Ben’s skin, Diego and Five took care of some of the others while Luther shielded Allison, still bloodless and shaky from trauma.

When it’s done, Klaus staggers and Diego reaches out to catch him. Ben is frowning. “Klaus, I can’t stay,” he says, but Klaus cuts him off.

“No, no, no,” he answers, “you can, I can do it now—” 

“Klaus.” Diego says, gently, just as Ben says the same.

“Klaus, I can come back, we can do it now,” Ben says softly, his arm on Klaus’s. “And you know you always see me.” Diego looks up at that, frowning, but Ben ignores him. “But right now—it’s draining you, man.” Klaus looks up, his expression a painting of misery and desperation, and Ben’s face softens.

Klaus opens his mouth like he’s going to protest or apologise, so Diego overrules him. “Do it, Ben,” he says, and when Klaus stares at him Diego squares his jaw. “I l-love you but Klaus is dead weight right now.” Klaus closes his eyes and Diego tightens his grip on his brother. “Promise to come back?”

Ben nods, and Diego nods back, and then Klaus is shuddering as Ben’s blue figure fades away. “Is he still here?” Diego asks, and exhales in relief when Klaus nods exhaustedly.

The siblings converge, Diego still supporting Klaus, and it’s then that it hits them. “Vanya,” starts Luther, but Klaus immediately sends him such a sharp look that the bigger man shuts his mouth.

Allison shakes her head, wishing for her words so that she could condemn them all for their _stupid_ plan of attacking Vanya, settling for scowling at them all and hoping they can pick up on the subtext. Five puts his hands in his pockets to hide their tremor.

“It’s still March,” he says shortly, clearing his throat. “We don’t—know if the apocalypse is still happening.” Allison transfers her glare to him, but he doesn’t falter under it. “We need to find her, and—”

Diego interjects. “And what, man? You saw—what she did.”

“She didn’t hurt us,” Klaus breathes out in a weakly angry protest, “she didn’t hurt anyone.” Luther looks away and Ben, by Klaus' side, narrows his eyes.

Five glances at him. “Be that as it may, we need to ensure that the apocalypse _is_ averted.”

Klaus stiffens, and Allison straightens up indignantly, stepping forward with clenched fists. Five raises his eyebrows, looking a bit—hurt? sheepish? regretful? “I don’t mean—containing her, or killing her… I just mean to _watch_ her.” He shrugs helplessly, “None of us even know how Vanya’s powers _work. Vanya_ doesn’t even know. For all we know, Vanya being the bomb isn’t a conscious choice of hers.”

“How do we find her, then?” Luther speaks up, always trying to take charge when the group needs direction, but he withers when Allison turns her accusatory eyes on him.  

They head outside, to get their bearings, and it’s there that Luther’s question is answered. Five, eyebrows raised, says, “I’d say we start by following that,” and the siblings all stare with wide eyes at the soft glow emanating from a few streets away.

“What exactly _are_ Vanya’s powers?” Klaus breathes out, from Diego’s side, his voice filled not with fear but amazed confusion, and the brothers exchange glances. Allison leads the way at a fast pace, Luther jogging to keep up and Allison subsequently speeding up even more, and Five looks at his two bruised brothers with a half-smile.

“The apocalypse isn’t quite how I pictured it,” he mumbles, as though saying it to himself. He turns to look at the light in the sky and lets himself hope recklessly for the first time in years, hoping desperately, _desperately_ , that whatever Vanya has become holds some resemblance to the sister he used to know. He thinks, judging by the way that light is twisting and shimmering in the night sky, that under everything Vanya remains that sad, lonely little girl filled with so much love but never allowed to express it, who found an outlet in creating art but had even that ignored.

* * *

When they find Vanya, she’s standing in the middle of the street. Klaus stares at the sky with wide eyes, quickest to notice that it’s raining on this street thought it hadn’t been raining where they came from. No one says anything about it, so he wonders faintly if they realised at all, and then he thinks _probably not, given our track record_. Ben stays close to his side, Diego glued to the opposite, and the apocalypse stands in the centre of the road in a glowing white suit.

She’s got her face tilted to the sky, and the siblings exchange glances. She doesn’t seem to have noticed them. Her violin is held loosely in one hand, bow dangling between her fingertips, with her second hand reaching out to catch rain on her open palm. Her hair is floating softly around her shoulders. The raindrops closest to Vanya glow, as though ringed in light, as though illuminated. The ground under her feet is cracked, the streetlights are blown out and their poles warped. There is destruction and beauty all around her, and Diego is reminded of all the times he’d wonder how quiet tiny Vanya would be able to survive in the world. (None of them had ever thought she'd be capable of _ending_ it.)

Allison takes a few steps forward, but she can’t talk, so she slows down uncertainty before getting very far. The others freeze, looking at each other nervously, and Klaus can't take it anymore. He staggers forward and away from Diego’s hold before any of the others can stop him. Five hisses his name, Luther swallowing a shout and Diego’s grasping fingers grabbing only air, but Klaus blocks them out and makes his way over to his little sister.

The closer he gets, the stranger the air feels. It’s as though gravity shifts around her. The rain falls slower, spinning on its descent to the ground, and there are leaves swirling around Klaus' feet when he steps closer to his white-eyed sister. The air feels—not quite static, but _shifted_. Cracks splinter out from under Vanya's feet, as though she is standing in the middle of a spider’s web, but she's standing still and steady. 

Vanya turns her head to look at him when he’s standing beside her. Her eyes are white-rimmed, but their insides the same lonely brown that Klaus has always known. Her hair, floating around her shoulders, ripples as though underwater. There’s no recognition in her face when she looks at him, and Klaus swallows the feelings that claw their way up his throat.

“Vanya,” Klaus says, the word a soft sigh. “You played beautifully.” His smile is crooked but genuine. He wonders distantly if this is where he’s going to die. She could do it, he knows she could, but just like when Luther showed him their baby sister locked in a spiked cage, he can’t believe she would ever _choose_ to do so. He wasn't lying, when he told Luther that Vanya used to cry for ants. She's always been little Seven to him, even after her book, little Seven who was so silent and sensitive, who so rarely smiled.

No, Klaus can't imagine that she wants to kill him, not really. If anyone understands not being able to understand your powers, it’s him.

Vanya’s face turns away from him again, and Klaus takes a breath. In, then out. His fists curl and then relax, glowing blue, and Ben solidifies on Vanya’s other side. 

“Hi, Vanya,” says Ben softly, and Vanya stares. When she looked at Klaus, she saw straight though him. With Ben, she sees _him_ and she can _only_ see him. The world shrinks, and her dead brother smiles at her. The white in her eyes trembles and shrinks, the rain stills around her, and the white light creeping up her arms freezes in place.

“Ben,” she breathes, reaching her free hand out almost subconsciously just as Ben does the same. Vanya stares at their touching hands in amazement, then looks to Klaus. She doesn’t speak, but he can see her unspoken question and nods, his throat thick and choked. Vanya’s siblings spent so many years hurting her, hurting her by omission even when not by intention, but Ben’s death was the catalyst for the fractures that splintered their family so irreparably and Vanya hasn’t seen her dead brother in over a decade.

When Ben reaches forward to wrap Vanya in a hug, she hugs back. It takes her a moment, her hands still and unresponsive for too long, and resting on his back too lightly when they finally rise, but she hugs back, still holding her violin and bow in her one hand, and Klaus can barely feel the tears that mingle with the rain on his cheeks. “I won’t hurt you,” Ben says gently to her, “I won’t hurt you, it's okay, I won’t hurt you.”

Ben whispers something into Vanya’s hair, and the rain grows and grows, past the street where she stands, blanketing the city in her terrible sorrow, the ache she’s never stopped feeling but never truly _felt,_ not like this. Ben fades, Klaus shaking on his feet, and Vanya’s hands come to cover her face.

Her shoulders shudder, just once. Klaus, looking at her, thinks that for all her own faults and despite the terrible power he knows she possesses, his little sister is trying to break his heart. Ben is trying not to cry, his fingers passing through Vanya harmlessly when he tries to hold her shoulders, and Klaus is moving before he even acknowledges it. He wraps his arms around Vanya, pulling her into his chest, her fingers still covering her face, and moves his arms to bracket her body, loosely prying the violin and bow from her hand. 

Her glow dies. The rain comes down, torrential when it had been crystal and harmless only minutes ago, and still Klaus holds her. The world is silent except for the sound of water hitting pavement.

Ben looks around them, his hand resting on Vanya’s back, stroking her hair. “Maybe the world doesn’t end in fire,” he says it very quietly, even though Klaus is the only one who can hear him. “This, all of this, is Vanya’s apocalypse.”

* * *

She doesn’t feel it when Allison comes up behind her, wrapping her own arms around her and Klaus, her damp curls mingling with Vanya’s. She doesn’t feel it when Diego takes her violin carefully from Klaus’s fingers or when Five stands by Klaus and tries to work up the courage to join their hug, nor when Diego lays a heavy hand on Klaus’ shoulder and keeps it there, nor when Luther puts a hand on Allison’s back and she doesn’t throw him off.

The rain comes down and the umbrella academy drowns. (Whatever remains will not be the same. The people they used to be are washed away.)

**Author's Note:**

> pls review friends!!
> 
> also, if anyone here reads "until the sun",, y'all i am SO SORRY for the wait but i promise there's a new chapter on the way. i'm the worst. thank u all for your support i love u


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